Luther and Lutheranism

Martin Luther was eight years old when Christopher Columbus set sail from Europe and landed in the Western Hemisphere. Luther was a young monk and priest when Michaelangelo was painting the Sistine Chapel in Rome...

ELCA Good Gifts Catalog

Assignment Process

Assignment completes candidacy for all people, including those ordained in another Lutheran church or Christian tradition, moving them toward first call and admittance to the appropriate roster in the ELCA...

50 Years of Ordained Women

With gratitude for those who have gone before and hope for the future, the ELCA gives thanks to God for the ministry of women. In 2019 and 2020 we celebrate 50 years of Lutheran women being ordained in the United States, 40 years of women of color being ordained, and 10 years of LGBTQIA+ individuals being able to serve freely.

Sanctuary Denomination

In its simplest form, becoming a sanctuary denomination means that the ELCA is publicly declaring that walking alongside immigrants and refugees is a matter of faith. In baptism, we are brought into a covenantal relationship with Jesus Christ that commits us to strive for justice and peace in all the earth.

For just as the body is one and has
many members, and all the members of the body,

though many, are one body, so it is
with Christ. —I Corinthians 12:12

May 13, 2020

Dear church,

Christ is risen indeed!
Alleluia!

During the uncertainty of the COVID-19
pandemic, I am encouraged by your resilience and creativity in our witness to the
life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. I am also inspired by your
generosity. Through the ELCA
COVID-19 Response Fund and our Daily Bread grants, we are providing critical support to struggling yet vital
ministries across this church. Through Lutheran
Disaster Response International we have
intensified our accompaniment of global partners. We are church together.

This is a trying time for us all. At
the same time, we know that a disproportionate burden of illness, death,
discrimination and harassment falls on communities of color. This pandemic has
exacerbated racism and racial inequities deeply entrenched in society and
across the church. We see this in the growing anti-Asian racism and the
disproportionate number of deaths in black, American Indian and Latinx
communities. I have been learning from the leaders of the ELCA’s ethnic associations how the data we see on the news is experienced in real life. I have listened
to leaders of color share the impact of this pandemic on their communities — on
their lives and on their ministries. These stories are difficult but important,
so we are launching a special series on LivingLutheran.org to lift up these voices for us all to hear. We also seek to
ensure that our COVID-19 response more effectively tends to the realities of
racism and racial inequality. We are church together.

Recently, in cities across this
country, we have seen horrifying anti-Semitic and white supremacist messages
displayed during public protests against government orders that are intended to
protect lives. No matter our politics or
opinions about our elected leaders and their policies, all of us must come
together on the basis of our church’s commitments to condemn racism against indigenous people and
people of color, white
supremacy, sexism, and anti-Semitism whenever they occur. Whether our churches and communities
are racially diverse or predominantly white, our work for racial and economic justice for all people is work for all of us. We are church
together.

Just as
God has joined us to the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ in baptism, we
are joined to each other. Paul helps us to understand this by speaking of the
one body of Christ, with many members. While this is always true, perhaps we
feel it more acutely in this time of physical distancing. In our longing to be
church together, let us be even more intentional in sharing with each other,
easing each other’s burdens, consoling each other in our fear and grief,
condemning what is contrary to the gospel and living out our baptismal covenant
“to strive for justice and peace in all the earth.”

- - -About the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America: The ELCA is one of the largest Christian denominations in the United States, with nearly 3.5 million members in more than 9,100 worshiping communities across the 50 states and in the Caribbean region. Known as the church of "God's work. Our hands," the ELCA emphasizes the saving grace of God through faith in Jesus Christ, unity among Christians and service in the world. The ELCA's roots are in the writings of the German church reformer Martin Luther.

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This is Christ's church.

There is a place for you here.

We are the church that shares a living, daring confidence in God's grace. Liberated by our faith, we embrace you as a whole person--questions, complexities and all. Join us as we do God's work in Christ's name for the life of the world.